EXCITONIC POLARITONS IN QUANTUM-CONFINED SYSTEMS AND APPLICATIONS TO OPTOELECTRONIC DEVICES

An excitonic polariton is a complex quasiparticle that consists of a photon and an exciton. Excitonic polaritons have recently been shown to exist in quantum-confined systems such as GaAs quantum wells. Based on the coherent coupling between the charged electron (hole) and light, the quantum-confined excitonic polariton has the characteristics of large coherence length and large phase modulation under electric fields. Furthermore, because of the inherent large refractive index, the spatial shape of the guided mode of the excitonic polariton transmitted in such quantum-confined waveguides is expected to be squeezed significantly. We discuss the characteristics of such excitonic polaritons and possible applications to ultrasmall optoelectronic devices.